


Other, Better Years

by keyboardclicks



Series: "Men at Some Time are Masters of Their Fates" [7]
Category: Raffles - E. W. Hornung
Genre: Angst, Gen, I apologize in advance, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-15
Updated: 2017-03-15
Packaged: 2018-10-05 16:22:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10312265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/keyboardclicks/pseuds/keyboardclicks
Summary: I wished I could hate him, that devil who had dragged me into the life I had never asked for, never wanted, but by that point I knew it was useless.  I had learned early on that hating Raffles, hating what we had done together, only made prison worse, not better.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [In the Crystal of a Dream](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9827477) by [McEnchilada](https://archiveofourown.org/users/McEnchilada/pseuds/McEnchilada). 



> Happy Ides of March have some angst.

There was no talking between prisoners in Reading Gaol.  If you tried and were caught you would be beaten.  

You were almost always caught.  

Guards could speak if they wished but saved their voices to be used as weapons against the weak and powerless, the lot of us whose names had been stripped and replaced with the cold, indifferent numbers inscribed on each of our cells.  Enough time in that place and you could forget that a voice had any purpose than to frighten.  I nearly had.

There was one guard who was not as especially terrible as the rest.  He was not kind to us, but he was not unnecessarily cruel.  If you deserved it, he would thrash you.  If not, he would leave you well enough alone.  He afforded me one kindness, very small, and that was to tell me the date if I so asked.  I did not know if he did this for any other prisoners, only that we had no way to record the length of our stay.  We were not allowed pen or paper or any other sort of thing though I knew of an exception in the cell next to mine, C.3.3, whom I had once seen being delivered pen, ink, and paper.  I knew who the man was; I had met him only once, at a party Raffles had taken me to.  His face, changed as it was from time spent in the hell called Reading Prison, was not one a person could forget.

But this is not the story of him; perhaps another day, elsewhere, elsewhen.  

There was a guard, as I had mentioned, who allowed me the kindness of knowing the date should we ever meet outside of my cell.  It was always an understated, matter-of-fact thing.  He rarely even looked at me as he said it, and all the better for both of us.  I would repeat it to myself in my head again and again until I was sure I remembered, and would continue doing so for the next few days, trying to count down the torturous days one by one.  If I could only hang on to it I could see the small bit of light at the end of this torturous tunnel.  But there would always come a day when I would forget, or be unsure if the previous day had been the 6th or the 7th, and I would again have to wait for the guard to enlighten me.

“15th March.”

It took me a few moments to realize the significance of what the guard had said to me, and then more time after to wrestle down the urge to ask him for a repetition.  15th March.  With a simple date I found so much significance, so much unwanted emotions.

The rest of the day was spent in a mental haze to rival the London fog, not that my mind was particularly clear during any given moment in that place.  When I was returned to my cell that night I ate the paltry meal meal given to all us prisoners, and lay awake despite my physical exhaustion.

“15th March,” I muttered to myself.  I was unsure if it was with fondness or bitterness I recalled the date.  Perhaps both.  

Closing my eyes I could recall another 15th of March, one I’m sure anyone who reads this will have no trouble in guessing.  I remembered my desperation, the thoughts of suicide which I was lately once again familiar with, and the hope which had come to me in the form of Raffles.  I remembered the look in his eyes when I withdrew my pistol, the twinkling light in them as he had spoken of and then carried out a crime.  I recalled every rush of adrenalin and fear during the job and afterwards as we looked at the jewels strewn upon the table and at each other, and I regretted absolutely nothing I had done.  I wished I could have.  I wished I could have regretted and repented, hated Raffles for the life he had dragged me into and the hell I was now facing because of it, but by then I knew it was useless to try.  During my first days in prison I had found that hating him and what we had done only made prison worse, not better.

Some may think I cried that night, thinking of better places and better years, but I did not.  I was much too exhausted to cry.  Instead I sighed and stared absently at the ceiling, drumming the fingers of one hand against my chest.

_ “Why man he doth bestride the narrow world,  _

_ like a Colossus, and we are petty men _

_ Walk under huge legs and peep about  _

_ To find ourselves dishonorable graves…” _

Hearing my own voice, so much softer than those harsh yells we all knew from the guards, was so strange.  I thought of how long it had been since I had heard a word of kindness from a voice other than my own, excluding of course the guard’s one charity to me.  I knew the rest of the passage I had recited, to be sure, but was far too exhausted then to recall it with any sort of clarity.  Even if I had not wished it, even if I was not comfortable in that cold, hard cell, I was falling victim to my exhaustion.  Closing my eyes, I let those images of more wonderful years be the lullabye which pulled me into sleep.


End file.
